1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a tape printing device for printing one or more lines of input characters on strip-like tape.
2. Background Art
In the case of a conventional tape printing device for printing a title on the spine of a binder or on what is called a title label to be attached to a cassette for use in a VCR (VIDEO CASSETTE RECORDER) or in a VTR (VIDEO TAPE RECORDER), input characters entered by using keys or the like for inputting characters are printed on a side of tape, on the other side of which an adhesive layer is formed, by performing a thermal transfer printing or the like. Thereby, an objective printed tape is produced.
In the conventional tape printing device, operating elements (keys or buttons or the like) for entering information representing characters are placed on a console panel. Users can input a desired sequence of characters by operating these operating elements for entering information representing characters. Moreover, this conventional tape printing device is formed in such a manner that tape can be fed through a tape discharging slot by driving a tape feeding mechanism. Furthermore, a printing mechanism, which is constituted by a thermal print head, and a tape cutting mechanism are placed in series in this passage for tape.
When a print directing key is operated, a control means of the tape printing device controls and causes the tape feeding mechanism to feed the tape at a predetermined speed. The control means further controls and causes a print station to print preliminarily inputted characters on the fed tape. Moreover, upon completion of printing of a sequence of the characters, the control means of the tape printing device continuously controls and causes the tape feeding mechanism to feed the tape without printing characters (namely, perform a non-printing feeding operation on the tape) until a printed part of the tape goes out of the device. Thereafter, the control means causes the tape feeding mechanism to make the tape stop running.
Further, after the tape stops running, a user operates the tape cutting mechanism to thereby obtain a custom label, on which the sequence of desired characters are printed.
Meanwhile, a user sometimes inputs character strings erroneously to the tape printing device of such a kind and operates a printing operation element without being aware of an error. Further, the tape printing device of such a kind is adapted so that a user can freely designate the typefaces, sizes and arrangement of characters and so forth. However, a user sometimes causes the tape printing device to print characters without correcting attributes of characters, which have been erroneously designated. Further, sometimes, a user advertently operates the printing operation element halfway through a character inputting stage.
Upon occasion, a user is aware of such an error in the middle of a character printing operation. The conventional tape printing device, however, possesses the properties that a medium, on which characters are printed, is tape and that the number of characters to be printed is considerably small and a print time is short, in comparison with other kinds of character information processors (for example, what is called a word processor). Thus the conventional tape printing device does not have the function of stopping a printing operation. Therefore, when a user wishes to cease printing so as to effectively avoid wasting expensive tape, the user operates a power-supply operation element and turns off the power to thereby cease printing. Thereafter, the user turns on the power again and corrects the error. Subsequently, the user causes the device to perform a non-printing feed operation on tape and then print the correct characters again. Thus the user obtains a desired label.
However, such an operation of turning off the power and printing characters again in this way has the problem that if such an operation is not performed without errors, the tape is wasted.
As shown in FIG. 1(A), in the case of the conventional tape printing device, a thermal printing head 2 and a tape cutting mechanism 3 are placed in series on a tape transport passage on which tape T is moved by a tape feeding mechanism (not shown) in the direction of an arrow A (incidentally, an ink ribbon is omitted). Therefore, when the power is turned off and the printing operation is suspended, unfinished tape is left between the thermal printing head 2 and the tape cutting mechanism 3 (see FIG. 1(B)).
Thus, a label, on the leading part of which an unnecessary character is printed, is made if the power is then turned on and the printing operation is performed again without a non-printing feeding of the tape. Therefore, in the case that the power is turned off halfway through a printing operation, it is necessary to perform a non-printing feeding operation on tape and then cut the tape before the next printing operation is instructed. However, when a user wrongly operates a printing operation element in the tape printing device, a user may not perform a non-printing feeding operation on tape. Further, the user may turn off the power and leave the tape. In such a case, the user is required to cut a label, which is made by resuming a printing operation on the tape, namely, by arranging a character string, which has not been printed, at the head of a character string to subsequently be printed on the tape, at the front position of the label with scissors or the like.
Moreover, even in the case that the tape has been fed without printing characters or the like, if the amount of a fed part of tape is too small, an unnecessary character may be printed at the front position of the label (see FIG. 1(B)). Conversely, if too large, the tape is wasted by the amount of an excessively fed part thereof (see FIG. 1(C)).
Objects to be printed by the tape printing device are labels. Thus, in the case of printing a label by using the tape printing device, it is very frequent that a user requires the tape printing device to print mixed characters of various character sizes thereon, as compared with the case of making printed matter by using other kinds of character information processors. The tape printing device, therefore, have characters of various character sizes available. Moreover, the tape printing device is adapted so that the character size can be easily altered in a part of a character string to be printed. Such various character sizes include not only character sizes of characters represented by blocks of dots, in each of which the number of columns of dots is equal to that of rows of dots, but also other character sizes of characters, each of which is laterally shrunk. Thus, there are provided many kinds of the sizes of full-size characters. Further, the character size of a character can be easily changed among the sizes of full-size characters. Consequently, half-size characters are not available in the conventional tape printing device. When a user requests the conventional tape printing device to print a character of the size which is of the order of the half size, the tape printing device copes with such a request by using a smaller full-size character size.
Here, the half-size character is a character whose width is half the printing width of an ordinary character. Especially, in the case of kanji characters of Japanese and Chinese, the number of dots required for forming a kanji character is larger than that of dots required for forming a letter of the English alphabet. Thus, in the case of printing a numeric character that can be represented by dots of the number which is as small as that of dots required for representing a letter of the English alphabet, usually, both of a corresponding half-size numeric character, whose character width is half the character width of a kanji character, and a corresponding full-size numeric character, which represents a number by using dots of the same number as of dots required to represent a kanji character, are properly used.
Further, labels, which are printed matter made by using the tape printing device, are frequently used as those to be attached to the spine of a file cover, or to a cassette tape for use in AV equipment. In the case when put to such uses, character strings printed on labels often contain dates. Moreover, files and cassette tapes are often placed in longitudinal positions, respectively. Therefore, labels, on each of which characters are written and printed in such a manner that the characters are written longitudinally or vertically thereon, namely, in such a way that the direction of height of each of the characters is in agreement with the longitudinal or vertical direction of tape, are frequently attached thereto in longitudinal or vertical positions, respectively.
Thus, in the case that a character string contains Japanese characters "10 {character pullout} 23 {character pullout}" representing "October 23rd", if such a character string is printed in such a way that the direction of height of each of the characters is in agreement with the longitudinal direction of tape, a label printed with the characters "1", "0", "{character pullout}", "2", "3" and "{character pullout}", which are individually longitudinally or vertically written and are aligned in the longitudinal or vertical direction of the tape, is obtained. Consequently, when reading the printed character string, a user feels a strong sense of incongruity. Even if the size of the numeric characters contained in the character string representing the date are made to be smaller than that of the other characters, or even if the shrunken character size is selected as the size of the numeric characters, the characters "1", "0", "{character pullout}", "2", "3" and "{character pullout}" remain individually longitudinally or vertically written and aligned in the longitudinal or vertically direction of the tape. Thus, a user still feels a strong sense of incongruity when reading the character string.
It is not only in the case of longitudinally or vertically writing the characters that a user feels a sense of incongruity when reading the characters. Even in the case of laterally or horizontally writing the characters, when a plurality of numeric characters are aligned, a user sometimes feels a sense of incongruity. For example, in the case that Japanese characters "1234 {character pullout}" or the like contained in a character string representing an address are printed, the intervals, at which these numeric characters are written, sometimes appear to be too long.
Further, in the case of a label formed in the herein-above described manner, margins are provided in front of and behind a portion of a portion, on which the character string is printed, of tape in the longitudinal direction thereof by performing the aforementioned non-printing feeding operation on the tape. In the case of the conventional tape printing device, the length of such a margin is fixed. Actually, the tape used in the tape printing device is provided with release paper on the back surface thereof and is adapted so that when the release paper is peeled off, the tape can adhere to something. Moreover, the tape is adapted so that a thermal transfer of characters thereon can be achieved, and is enclosed in a tape cartridge. As a result, the tape has become expensive. Consequently, hitherto, the length of the margins has been fixed at a value that is set as short as possible.
The label, however, consists of a text portion and front, rear, top and bottom margins. Thus, if the length of, for example, the front and rear margins is set at a fixed value, a user cannot freely set the balance between the text portion and the space for the margins, so that a user sometimes is not satisfied with the set balance therebetween.
Thus, there has already been proposed a tape printing device adapted so that a user can designate the length of the front and rear margins from a plurality of kinds of values. However, some of tapes, which can be loaded into tape printing devices, have various kinds of tape widths. Even if the length of the margins is set in such a manner as to be most suitable for a tape having a certain width, this length of the margins is too long or too short for labels obtained by printing the characters on tapes having other tape widths. Therefore, every alteration of the tape to be loaded, it is necessary to perform an operation of changing the length of the margins. Thus, such a tape printing device is susceptible to improvement in operability thereof.
Further, a tape feeding mechanism entails a mechanistic operation and thus the power consumption thereof is large. As above described, the tape is expensive, so that when making a label, it is required that useless or wasteful parts of the tape are reduced as much as possible. Even in the case of the conventional tape printing device, a tape portion provided between a print head and a cutter mechanism is used as a front margin to be provided in front of the next text part to be printed. Thereby, the efficiency in using the tape, as well as the efficiency in consuming the power, is enhanced. However, in the case that for example, the length of the front margin is short, the tape portion provided between the print head and the cutter mechanism is wasted. Therefore, the aforementioned requirement is not fully satisfied.
Moreover, late or recent tape printing devices are adapted to deal with tapes of a large number of kinds of tape widths. Namely, the recent tape printing devices nearly satisfy user's requirements concerning the kinds of the tape width. It is, however, thought that a user needs a label whose width is wider than the widest width of the tapes used by the tape printing devices. Although a tape printing device may be configured in such a manner as to be able to deal with wider tape, it is considered from the viewpoint of cost-performance or the like as very disadvantageous to configure a tape printing device by taking a tape width, which is employed extremely rarely, into account.
Thus, there has been contrived an enlargement printing system whereby a pseudo label being equivalent to a label, which has a width being N times the width of tape loaded in the system and is printed with enlarged characters, is obtained by first dividing a tape, the printing of which is completed, into N sub-tapes aligned in the longitudinal direction of the tape, and by subsequently placing the N sub-tapes in such a manner as to adjoin in the direction of the width of the tape. For instance, as illustrated in FIG. 2(A), in the case of performing the enlargement printing by employing 2 times as a magnification or enlargement ratio, an upper half MU of an object such as a character string to be printed is first printed on a tape T. Then, a margin of a predetermined length is left thereon. Subsequently, a lower half MD of the object to be printed is printed thereon.
Incidentally, in the case of a tape printing device whose main purpose is to make a label, it is required to make a label readable easily by providing top and bottom margins arranged in the direction of the width of tape. Thus, when printing normally, the top and bottom margins are formed by setting the printable width of a print head at a value that is narrower than the width of tape loaded into the device. If the setting of the printable width of a print head at a value, which is narrower than the width of tape loaded into the device, is employed, it is unnecessary to alter a structure for driving the print head. Therefore, such a setting is preferable. In this case, as illustrated in FIG. 2(A), the top and bottom margins can be also formed when performing the enlargement printing.
After the tape T, on which the enlargement printing is completed as above described, is divided into a fore-tape-portion T1 and a hind-tape-portion T2 (see FIG. 2(B)), the top and bottom margins formed on each of the tape-portions T1 and T2 at the time of the enlargement printing are cut off therefrom. Then, these tape-portions T1 and T2 obtained by dividing the tape are placed side by side in the vertical direction as viewed in this figure. Thereby, a large label, whose width is wider than that of the tape, can be formed.
If, however, a dividing position is shifted from a predetermined position when dividing the tape T into the fore-tape-portion T1 and the hind-tape-portion T2, the front and rear edges of the upper tape-portion T1 are shifted from those of the lower tape-portion T2, respectively, in the case that these tape-portions are stuck to each other so that the text part of the tape-portion T1 is not shifted from that of the tape-portion T2 laterally. Further, in the case that the dividing position is shifted from the predetermined position, if the two tape-portions T1 and T2 are stuck to each other so that the front or rear edge of the tape-portion T1 is adjusted to the corresponding one of the front and rear edges of the tape-portion T2, the text part of the upper tape-portion is shifted from that of the lower tape-portion. Thus, a desirable label is not obtained. On the contrary, an awkward label is formed.
Furthermore, when removing the top and bottom margins, if these margins are not correctly cut and removed straight, a gap is formed between the upper text part and the lower text part (as illustrated in FIG. 2(C)). Alternatively, the upper text part and the lower text part are placed in such a manner as to overlap each other unnaturally.
Incidentally, as a device for making a rendering tape on condition that a printed part is transferred, there has already been proposed a device having an enlargement printing function (refer to the Japanese Patent Laying-Open (Kokai) No. 6-162256/1988 Official Gazette). In the case of making a rendering tape, even if the dividing position is shifted from the mid-point of the tape from which the two tape-portions are obtained, it is no problem because a printed part is transferred onto another sheet of paper or the like. Moreover, because of the condition that the printed part is transferred, it is unnecessary to form the top and bottom margins to be provided in the direction of the width of the tape, when printing. Therefore, there are not caused the aforementioned disadvantages of the tape printing device which aims mainly to the making of a label.
It is a first object of the present invention to provide a tape printing device which can form a label as a user desires, without wasting tape.
Further, it is a second object of the present invention to provide a tape printing device which can reduce a waste of tape even when stopping a printing operation, and can easily perform the subsequent operation.
Moreover, it is a third object of the present invention to provide a tape printing device which can increase the variety of manners of printing numeric characters, thereby obtaining a label on which a plural-digit number representing a date, an address and so on are printed in such a way as to cause a user to feel no sense of congruity.
Furthermore, it is a fourth object of the present invention to provide a tape printing device by which a user can easily obtain a label that has his desired margins.
Additionally, it is a fifth object of the present invention to provide a tape printing device which can be very highly efficient in using tape and can reduce the power consumption.
Besides, it is a sixth object of the present invention to provide a tape printing device which can form a large label, whose width is wider than the width of tape, easily and accurately by enlargement printing.